NHS visor contract for Cricklade-based firm

By Barrie Hudson - 10 July 2020

Business

GWP Protective is teaming up with one of its existing customers to supply 5.5 million visors over the next 26 weeks.

  • GWP Group Managing Director Ruth Cook

    GWP Group Managing Director Ruth Cook

GWP Protective is a Salisbury arm of GWP Group, whose base is in Chelworth, Cricklade.

Although GWP typically produces foam inserts for protective packaging products, this isn’t the first time it has been involved in the manufacture of face visors for healthcare workers.

In April, at the height of the coronavirus outbreak, it worked with Gloucester engineering business Orthotropic to produce and then donate more than 500 visors.

GWP Group Managing Director Ruth Cook said: “We’d already had experience of producing visors so knew straight away our expertise and manufacturing capability would be perfect for producing the foam parts for these.”

“We’ve had the opportunity to assist in a number of areas that we wouldn’t normally be involved with during the pandemic, including these visors, and also manufacturing safety screens to allow employees to return to work in specific industries.

“We are proud that we have been able to play a small part in the fight against the virus, whilst maintaining the highest levels of service for our customers too.”

Richard Coombes, General Manager at GWP Protective, said: “When we were approached about manufacturing the foam elements of the face visors, we knew this was a great opportunity to help the NHS in their fight against coronavirus.

“We have been supporting a number of customers that operate in critical industries such as medical, health care and pharmaceutical throughout the pandemic. But manufacturing the visors has meant we are now considerably busier than we would have anticipated at this point.”

The company, which used to be known as Eastman Packaging before rebranding as GWP Protective, has already supplied about half a million cut foam pads and is also supplying various foam sheets.

GWP Group – of which GWP Protective is one of five divisions – employs more than 100 people across its two sites in Wiltshire, manufacturing a wide range of packaging products.

The group celebrates 30 years in business next month.

 

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